Katherine Heigl: Criticizing ‘Knocked Up’ Was A ‘Dumbass Moment’

Like most people, Katherine Heigl once complained about an aspect of her job she didn't particularly enjoy. But unlike most people, she used a Vanity Fair interview to do it. Now, eight years later, she realizes being so overtly criticalof a movie she worked on -- on such a public platform -- probably wasn't one of her better decisions.

"I know, I always get into it…just stick my foot in [my mouth],” she told Howard Stern of the time she referred to the Judd Apatow comedy Knocked Up as "a little sexist."

“I liked it, I liked the move a lot. I just didn’t like me," she continued. "She was kind of like..,she was so judgmental and kind of uptight and controlling and all these things and I really went with it while we were doing it, and a lot of it — Judd allows everyone to be very free and improvise and whatever — and afterwards I was like, 'Why is that where I went with this? What an a--hole she is!'"

Back in 2008, Heigl was interviewed by Vanity Fair, where she said, "[Knocked Up] paints the women as shrews, as humorless and uptight, and it paints the men as lovable, goofy, fun-loving guys. It exaggerated the characters, and I had a hard time with it, on some days. I'm playing such a bitch; why is she being such a killjoy? Why is this how you're portraying women? Ninety-eight percent of the time it was an amazing experience, but it was hard for me to love the movie.”

The rest of the cast didn’t take too kindly to Heigl’s assessment of the film — something she found out when she bumped into her former Knocked Up co-star Seth Rogen a few years later.

"I ran into him at a restaurant and I didn't quite realize that it was as serious as it was,” she told Stern. “I walked up like, 'Hey, guys!' And they were like very, like, [cold] and I was like, 'Oh, you're really mad, I didn't realize that it was that bad...I get it.'”

Though Heigl says at the time she was merely responding to the Vanity Fair reporter's question about the film's perceived sexism, she recognizes her comments were a mistake: "I absolutely owe anyone an apology I unwittingly offended or disrespected. I get it. It was an immature, dumbass moment."